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Month: March 2011

I panic when I don’t have a lip gloss or lip balm in my purse, I can not fall asleep without applying a balm before bed and I can barely concentrate if my lips feel dry. I’m always on the hunt for some kind of moisturizing lip product and I’ve recently stumbled across a good one.

Want to hear a Sephora.com secret? If you type “sale” in the search box, that will pull up all the products they have on sale. I use this feature a lot when I have an order that totals almost $50, because anything over $50 ships free. A couple of weeks ago, I placed an order that came in at $47, so I searched the sales to see what was around $3 or $4 to move my order into the free shipping range.

I couldn’t find anything I liked for $3 or $4, but I found the LAVANILA Lip Shine in Pure Vanilla for $5. My lip gloss obsession wouldn’t allow me to buy anything else.

Here’s what’s great about it: It’s not sticky, it has no chemicals, parabens, or any of that bad crap and it moisturizes (I’ve read some reviews that said the Lip Shine was drying, but I didn’t find it to be at all). Contrary to its name, it’s actually pretty low shine. I prefer a little more shine, but hey, if it moisturizes and only costs $5, I’ll forgo the shine. And if packaging is important to you, this one is nice. It doesn’t leak or get sticky around the cap, and it doesn’t look like something a 12 year old would keep in her Justin Beiber makeup bag.

What I don’t like: The smell and the taste. The smell is not horrible–it’s got that Burt’s Bee’s/natural scent–but I like things that smell like dessert. Again, just a preference. It tastes like what I imagine beeswax would taste like, but it didn’t make me want to wash my mouth out like some other lip glosses/balms have. I’ve accidentally consumed substantial amounts of what tastes like cherry/passionfruit/coconut covered chemicals from lip products over the years and I’d prefer it if I never had to again.

This is my advice–if you are in the market for a good, cheap, moisturizing lip product, or you need to push your Sephora order into the free shipping zone, give this a try.